1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electronic image pickup apparatus, and more particularly an improved mechanism to fix optical elements in a camera lens barrel.
2. Description of the Related Art
Various propositions have been made for the improvement of a mechanism to hold optical elements in a lens holding mechanism.
FIG. 1 is a sectional view showing an example of the configuration of a conventional mechanism to hold optical elements.
In FIG. 1, a seal member 12 and a low-pass filter 16 are provided on a CCD 10 through a CCD rubber 14. The low-pass filter 16 is held by a low-pass filter holder 18 made of a resin member, for example. The low-pass filter 18 is formed to have a stage inside as shown in FIG. 1, and a holding part 18a at the front end has an opening and projects to a group of lenses 20. The low-pass filter 16 is fixed contacting the inside of the holding part 18a and the inside stage.
In the structure shown in FIG. 1, the low-pass filter 16 is fixed directly to the low-pass filter holder 18. Therefore, the thickness of the structure is increased in the optical axis direction by thickness of the holding part 18a. This causes a ghost image.
To solve the above problem, Jpn. Pat. Appln. KOKAI Publication No. 2003-35854 discloses a technique to hold a lens with a metallic member and to form the lens integrally with a resin-made guide member.